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Lacuna Coil Shallow Life Rare
Shallow Life is the fifth studio album by Italian gothic metal band Lacuna Coil. The album was released in April 2009 in Europe and North America through Century Media Records and EMI. As of September 2009, it has sold over 75,000 copies in the U.S. And 225,000 worldwide. Lacuna Coil: 2009 Shallow Life: Progressive metal Metal Gothic metal Alternative metal Power metal Heavy metal. Shallow Life: Progressive metal Metal Gothic metal Alternative metal Power metal Heavy metal. CD Album Standard Edition CD 1.
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Lacuna Coil Shallow Life Rare
Let's be honest people, our favorite bands have had one or two or even had many bad albums in any point of a band's career. I'm sure not everyone was impressed when Metallica abandoned they're black album sound for a more commercial sound and hasn't had anything as memorable as even the black album. Celtic Frost even made the notorious 'Cold Lake' to which even Tom Warrior found extremely ridiculous. For me, I'm not afraid nor reluctant to say that one of my favorite bands Lacuna Coil has had a bad sounding album. That is the case with 'Shallow Life', an album released after the success of 'Karmacode' which included the band's most well-known song 'Our Truth.' Lacuna Coil's fifth album has since been my least listened to albums in the entirety of Lacuna Coil's discography, for good reasons.
First things first is at least discuss the good things on the album. I did really enjoy the songs 'The Last Goodbye', and 'Not Enough' I think that they sounded simple and atmospheric in terms of guitar. The melody and Cristina Scabbia's singing in these are incredibly catchy and a little sad, but not depressing. 'Spellbound' was also good, though the guitar intro of the song should have been more catchy. 'Spellbound' even had a kick ass guitar solo that was also pretty catchy. Sure the lyrics are only passable on these three songs, but that is practically the only highlights on the album. Unless if you did not listen to the deluxe version of the album, then you only have 'Not Enough' to enjoy. Unfortunately, the good things I have mentioned on this album is not enough! Pun intended.
There were a lot of issues I have with 'Shallow Life', but the biggest problem with the album is how most of the singing in the album sounds in the album. The issue is not with Cristina Scabbia and Andrea Ferro's singing, I think they are great singers, but the main issue is the way they are singing in some of the songs. Either they toned down their power in one song, or they were singing in a key that made the song so bad on another. 'Survive', 'I'm Not Afraid', 'The Pain', and of course the infamous 'I Like It' have fallen victim by vocal approaches of singing different keys than what is meant to be. Not to mention the electronic songs that plagued songs like 'The Pain', 'I Like It.' Even the album's heaviest songs don't sound right and just sounds too stale.
'I Like It' is practically the worst Song in the album, and probably the worst Song Lacuna Coil ever wrote. To add insult to injury, the structure of the song, the lyrics, and the vocals that Cristina Scabbia presents in this song is one big fucking mess. This was one of those songs that showed that Lacuna Coil sold out because it sounds too commercial. What I don't get is why was this song a single and not 'Not Enough', so that you can show us your music video for that song, which looks pretty fucking dumb? Honestly, as a fan of Lacuna Coil, 'I Like It' felt like it shouldn't have been made. A verdict for this song is where I would change the title of the song to 'I Hate It.'
The last issue I had with 'Shallow Life' is the lyrical content. The lyrics are too simplistic, and it almost sounds like it was trying to reach for a commercial, radio friendly sound. It's almost as if the band wanted to write catchy tunes to get into the radio or something. Repeating the same things, and having non creative lyrical structure is another thing that hindered this album. The songs are short enough to be on radio too. The longest Song being four minutes song, which makes more sense if the band was trying to go for getting a song on the radio. They would succeed if they wanted to get on a pop radio station, not so much for rock radio, and sure as hell won't make it to metal stations unless it was the songs I mentioned earlier that were good.
Now 'Shallow Life' is far from being the worst metal album I have ever heard, but it is definitely one of the most disappointing albums to listen to. I think Lacuna Coil is a terrific band and they are one of two band's where I have listened to an entire discography, and even the Lacuna Coil fan inside my head says to avoid 'Shallow Life' unless you want to listen to 'Not Enough', 'Spellbound', or 'Wide Awake'. The album is too commercial, too simple, and feels watered down. You know that album titles are so bad that you make so many puns about the album. Heres an example: I won't tell you that while I was wide awake, I listened to this album again like an underdog. I'm not afraid to be trapped in a maze filled with musical insanity. I survived and said I did not like it, I was not spellbound, it was not enough and it gave me pain. Get it? Ten songs in just three sentences turned into ten puns. To top it all off, it doesn't even feel like a gothic metal record either, it's more of a fringe album for mall rats. You're better off listening to other Lacuna Coil albums, like 'Comalies', 'Unleased Memories', 'Broken Crown Halo', and 'Delirium.' This is tragically Shallow.
Favorite Tracks: 'Not Enough', 'Wide Awake', 'The Last Goodbye'